Public Strain

Since listening to “The Banana Album” I’ve been craving music that blends melodic hooks with experimental sounds and textures. That album helped me realize that noise rock is probably my favorite genre of music, I love albums like Nevermind and The Glow Pt. 2 that focus on textures and fuzz. Even albums I like that aren’t noise rock (like Pet Sounds) focus a lot on how the texture of an album sounds rather than just focusing on melody or rhythm (Pet Sounds famously uses the Wall Of Sound technique). I heard about this album and apparently it took influence from the VU by combining noisy textures with simple hooks and chord progressions. The band is called “Women” and consists of four dudes. So I listened to the album and it was mid. The songwriting and production are solid but there is just nothing memorable or note worthy about it. You shouldn’t make a good album to be experimental, you should be experimental to make a good album. Lou Reed and Brian Wilson did the latter, while Women did the former. I’m all for experimentation as long as it’s not just for the sake of it. So sadly while I love noise rock this album was mostly purposeless. Not bad, just mediocre.